Stuff we dig

Our annual holiday gift guide is not meant to be an enticement to buy more, more, more. It’s an invitation to be deliberate about our choices – to prioritize care, humanity and quality in the making of the things we choose as gifts. Here’s to a season of light, love, adventure and thoughtful consumption.

1. Smoothing body oil
This musky scent stopped me with dropper in mid-air: subtler than patchouli but infused with a similarly earthy vibe. Methinks it’s a combination of the basil and bergamot. The Baby le Bébé skincare line is made by a model-artist in small batches in the Catskills. Both face and body oil are deeply hydrating, soothing yesterday’s nicks, bites and chapped spots and boosting skin’s resilience for whatever today might bring. The particularly unusual scent of the body oil wins it our recommendation.
$62 / 4-ounce bottle
babylebebe.com

2. Mammoth pecans
This fourth-generation Georgia farm makes superior snack mixes pretty enough to sit front and center under the tree. But they are best known for their beautiful pecans – which the family has been farming since 1948 – and we can see why. Sunnyland Farms’ mammoth pecan halves are extra-large and tender, lightly salted yet sweet enough to be an after-dinner treat. Even the pickiest eater in our house has been found prying open the tin for a snack. Free shipping.
$49.80 / 1 lb 4 oz gift tin
sunnylandfarms.com

3. Dolphin Studio calendar
At first I was confused by this calendar, which is pricey and not conventionally useful – there’s nowhere to write anything. But as I lived with the hand-silkscreened pages, delighting in each new month’s playful oddity, I began to realize that I had stumbled into an art-soaked lineage. The ffrench family has been making these calendars for over five decades – since the patriarch, a ceramic artist, emigrated from Ireland to the Berkshires – earning a cult following along the way. Family members of all ages contribute artwork, sometimes from the time they are old enough to hold a brush. Walking into a friend’s house and seeing a Dolphin Studio calendar on the wall is like catching the sparkle of a pinch of Northeastern fairy dust.
$83
thedolphinstudio.com

4. Chocolate bonbons
In a world increasingly mass-produced, these hand-painted chocolates are a fittingly special way to mark one of life’s big moments. Each bite-sized chocolate tastes wildly different, its iridescent design mirroring its flavor, and each “collection” contains a unique assortment. This Cleveland-based Sweet Bean Chocolate studio is the brainchild of an artist who found her medium in chocolate and took her sideline full-time in 2019.
$13 / 4-piece gift box
sweetbeancandies.com

5. Charcoil air purifier
For those whose lives are on-the-go, the car can get stanky: wet sneakers and pets, melted ice cream, sweaty gym stuff and a forgotten banana peel = moldering funk. Designed in Seattle, the handsome Purggo air purifier made with hemp and organic cotton harnesses the natural odor-eliminating power of bamboo charcoal, keeping your car (or bathroom, kitty-litter corner, etc.) un-smelly all year long, not by masking smells like a typical car freshener but by absorbing them. Fragrance free, it’s allergy- and asthma-friendly. After a year’s useful life, re-use the bamboo charcoal inside as a plant fertilizer!
$29.99
purggo.com

6. Mukluks
I got a pair each of these durable, lightweight traditional winter boots for my dad and husband last year, and both wore them all winter, while my dad surprisingly continued wearing his to hike with his dog on the Appalachian Trail through the summer. Founder Patti Steger started making her mukluks in the 80s after wearing a pair of the boots on an Arctic dogsled expedition. The Minnesota-made Steger Mukluks have since been worn on expeditions to the North and South Poles and the Iditarod race in Alaska. For hunters, the Camuks Xtreme’s rubberized leather keep feet warm in extreme cold all day, down to 40 below, while still allowing them to breathe. For everyday winter life, the moosehide Klondike Mukluks are handsome enough to wear on the trail or out to dinner and are rated down to 30 below.
$280
mukluks.com

7. Barley tea
I first had barley tea at a friend’s house when her Korean mom served us a pitcher on ice on a hot summer day. I downed it so fast, my friend’s mom sent me home with a bunch of tea bags. When those ran out, barley tea became a memory... until now. Enter mo’mugi, the first and only barley tea made in North America. It’s made using organic barley by a pair of sisters in Canada who were inspired after a trip to Japan. Made hot, it tastes somewhere between tea and coffee (though it’s caffeine-free, as well as calorie- and sugar-free), and is just the ticket for the 3’oclock blahs. One compostable sachet makes up to a quart of tea.
$15.99 for 10 tea bags
teadesire.com

Some of the above items were provided free to the editor for gift guide consideration.